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Longmont may raise drainage, parks fees to rebuild from flood

By Scott RochatLongmont Times-Call

Posted:
10/04/2013 08:42:21 PM MDT

Updated:
10/04/2013 08:43:10 PM MDT

Water inundates a stretch of the St. Vrain Greenway near Izaak Walton Park at South Sunset Street. The devastation included significant damage to the St. Vrain Greenway, the city s popular system of walking and cycling paths that took about 20 years to build.
(
LEWIS GEYER
)

LONGMONT -- Longmont's stormwater and park fees may increase to help the city rebuild from the St. Vrain-Left Hand flood.

On Tuesday, the City Council will consider whether to increase stormwater fees by more than $5 a month, from the current monthly rate of $7.77 to a new rate of $13. If the proposal gets the green light, it could get final approval by Nov. 12 and go into effect on Dec. 1.

Even without the flood, the city had been considering a rate increase to cover the basic costs of Longmont's drainage system along with flood-control work on the St. Vrain River between Main Street and the railroad bridge. But the disaster added a few items to the list. Now it includes about $3.1 million of unexpected stormwater projects for 2014 alone, along with a $20 million bond in 2015 to put the river back in its old course -- if federal authorities approve the project and Longmont voters approve the bond.

"It depends on a lot of moving pieces," said Barbara McGrane, the public works department's business manager. "What we understand from FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) is they're going to look at the river on a segment-by-segment basis, and some segments are not going to be treated the same as others."

That means the city could get reimbursed on some parts of the "re-channelization" project, but not on others. The project also needs an OK from the Army Corps of Engineers, which again might come section-by-section.

Depending on how much gets approved, McGrane said, a second $20 million bond might be needed. On the other hand, she said, with enough federal aid and county cooperation, Longmont might not even need all of the first bond issue.

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"We don't want to have our citizens pay for more than their fair share," she said.

The flood also means that a park maintenance fee that already was slated to rise from $1 to $2 a month might go up still more. The council will consider on Tuesday whether to make that fee $4 a month for the next three years, to rebuild the hard-hit parks system.

Longmont officials estimate the flood did about $20 million in damage to the city's parks; roughly $18 million of that is expected to qualify for FEMA aid. If the aid gets approved, FEMA would pay 75 percent of that. Longmont's share of the rest, plus the repair work not covered by the federal government, would come to about $6.5 million.

The extra $2 in the parks fee would bring in $2.7 million by the end of 2016. The city also plans to use $2.3 million of conservation trust fund money -- state lottery money that Longmont mostly has used to build the St. Vrain Greenway in the past -- and $1.5 million in open space dollars to cover the remaining expenses.

The devastation included significant damage to the St. Vrain Greenway, the city's popular system of walking and cycling paths that took about 20 years to build. Natural resources manager Kim Shugar said she had heard a lot of interest in restoring the Greenway; right now, she said, the three-year fee addition was the most direct way the public could help.

"At this point, most of the work that can be done on it is not volunteer-based work," Shugar said.

City officials said they also would be postponing work on extensions to the St. Vrain Greenway, the planned Dickens Farm Park, and phase two of the Spring Gulch No. 2 Greenway to free up the necessary money.

In the case of Dickens -- a 52-acre park along the St. Vrain between Main and Martin streets that would allow kayaking and tubing -- the project literally has to go back to the drawing board due to the river's re-location.

"We'll have to go in and redesign the park," Shugar said. "Everything about the property is different from what the original design was based on."

The $1 park maintenance fee began in 2010 and was originally intended to expire at the end of 2012. A proposal to make it $2 and continue it indefinitely proved controversial on the City Council, which approved the plan by a 4-3 vote on Sept. 3, just nine days before the flood hit.

Councilman Gabe Santos, who had been a vocal opponent of continuing the fee, said he would support the new $4 proposal to help get the parks' revival under way.

"It took a natural disaster to change my mind on the maintenance fee," he said.

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